Pigeon pea, white yam: Ghana’s perfect crop combo

White yam is a profitable crop for Ghana’s smallholder farmers, but it poses two big problems: the plants need to be staked, which eats up about a third of production costs. Also, yams pull many nutrients out of the soil, forcing farmers to constantly search for new land and often clear forests in search of fertile ground.

A leguminous shrub, pigeon pea, could address both problems. A partnership between Michigan State University and the Borlaug Higher Education for Agricultural Research and Development program is exploring the perks of pigeon pea.

The goal of BHEARD, supported by the U.S. Agency for International Development, is to develop agricultural scientists and increase agricultural research capacity in partner countries. The program is named after Norman Borlaug, an American biologist, humanitarian and Nobel laureate who has been called “the Father of the Green Revolution.”

MSU’s Alliance for African Partnership recently awarded a $100,000 grant to two MSU assistant professors, two BHEARD students from Ghana and an economist from Ghana’s Council for Scientific and Industrial Research to study a combined pigeon pea/yam cropping system. Besides providing food and feed for livestock, pigeon pea fixes atmospheric nitrogen to the soil and provides stakes for yams.

The project’s principal investigator is Cholani Weebadde, an assistant professor in MSU’s Department of Plant, Soil and Microbial Sciences. Additional investigators include Hashini Galhena Dissanayake, an assistant professor in MSU’s Department of Entomology; CSIR’s Patricia Acheampong, an agricultural economist; and BHEARD’s Eric Owusu Danquah and Princess Hayford, both students in MSU’s Department of Plant, Soil and Microbial Sciences.

Hayford brings extensive experience with pigeon pea, a new crop for Ghanaian farmers, to the project. Owusu Danquah studied white yam production extensively before joining MSU in fall 2016. He sold Weebadde, his mentor at MSU, on the potential of combining pigeon pea and yam in a single cropping system.

Owusu Danquah recently traveled from Michigan to Ghana to plant crops in CSIR research fields located in forest and forest-savannah zones. Once the pigeon peas take root and grow enough biomass to fertilize the soil with stems thick enough to be used as stakes, Owusu Danquah will return later in the year to plant yams in the same fields.

By the summer of 2018, Ghanaian farmers will be able to observe the pigeon pea/yam cropping system firsthand. If the farmers see the new system for themselves and realize its potential to fertilize soil and save money on stakes, they will be more likely to adopt it, Weebadde said.

Owusu Danquah is evaluating two ways pigeon pea can act as a stake for yams: plant it in an alley, with yams in between and let the plants grow together; or, plant it near the yams, cut its thick stems off and use them as stakes.

The pigeon pea/yam research will serve as a case study for the AAP project’s larger goal: to demonstrate the utility of interdisciplinary research and networking. Owusu Danquah is building connections with MSU students, alumni and other international researchers ­­— connections that will continue long after he graduates and returns home.

Such peer networks are one way of combating the “brain drain” often experienced by developing countries. Trained scientists are less likely to leave home if they have peers to consult and access to adequate resources, Weebadde said. She sees MSU’s international students as future global ambassadors, paving the way to collaborative research beyond the borders of MSU and the United States.

MSU will host 72 high school teams in Jenison Field House on Sunday, Feb. 24, for the 2019 Michigan VEX Robotics State Championships. Around 500 of Michigan's top STEM high school students will participate.